ReSearching a Healthy Start || Yara Toenders & Wanda Tempelaar: Youth Mental Health and Well-being

ReSearching Diversity

In this bonus episode, we listen to Yara Toenders (fellow at Healthy Start / Erasmus University Rotterdam) and Wanda Tempelaar (clinical child and youth psychiatrist at the Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam). Both are members of the ambition “Youth Mental Health and Well-being” in Healthy Start, a consortium that aims to better understand and support the healthy development of all youths in the Netherlands.

PAST (00:02:10): Yara and Wanda both share the challenges and opportunities they have faced when relocating to another country during their studies and work life. They talk about the uncertainty and ambiguity, about coincidence and spontaneity, and about embracing their personal and professional journey.

PRESENT (00:11:50): Yara and Wanda give us insights into their daily work with youth in the Netherlands. Yara explains that any initiative to increase youth well-being, such as banning phones in schools, always has positive implications for some, while having negative implications for other youth. She shared with us what intrigued her during data collection and how reality is often very different from what we would expect from scientific theory. Wanda shares a moving story of a young client who successfully combated severe mental illness, and how as clinical psychiatrist Wanda was able to support this client during this process.

FUTURE (00:19:50): Yara and Wanda explain why it is crucial to work closely with youth themselves and how to use youths’ lived experiences to make research and treatment more meaningful.

This episode is part of the spin-off series “(Re)Searching a Healthy Start”, in which we uncover the pathways and struggles of inspiring scientists and practitioners working together in the Healthy Start consortium. Healthy Start is part of the convergence of the Technical University Delft, Erasmus University Rotterdam and Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands.
Want to know more? See https://convergence.nl/healthy-start/

For more information on the episode and guests, please visit researchingdiversity.com.
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We want to thank Minor Revisions for the music, Lotte Gottschewski-Kooijman for the logo design, Max Kersten for post production, and zeythehuman for their artwork. Stay tuned and talk soon!